Yuriy Biley – The Value of These Words also Depends on You

Yuriy Biley has reconstructed a roadside propaganda sign from the declining years of communist Poland. The source for this reconstruction is a photograph by Władysław Hasior from his Photo Notebook. While driving around Poland, Hasior documented instances of communist party Newspeak inscribed in the landscape, which Hasior called ”roadside poetry.” Biley’s work conveys the durability of the language of propaganda and its disturbing relevance today. While stressing the importance of language in public space, Biley ”updated” the slogan documented by Hasior by switching two letters. In line with the dynamic of current public debate and recent street protests, he changed Polak (a Polish man) to Polka (a Polish woman). (Text by Marta Czyż & Łukasz Gorczyca)

Exhibition, “You will have a monument, but it will never sing”, MOS, Gorzów Wielkopolski, Poland.

The work can be viewed in front of Galeria Labirynt (ul. Popiełuszki 5).
Free access.